Town of Jericho v. Town of Morristown
| Decision Date | 09 March 1905 |
| Court | Vermont Supreme Court |
| Parties | TOWN OF JERICHO v. TOWN OF MORRISTOWN. |
Exceptions from Chittenden County; Haselton, Judge.
Action by the town of Jericho against the town of Morristown. Heard in county court on agreed statement of facts. Judgment pro forma for plaintiff, and defendant excepts. Reversed.
Argued January term, 1905, before ROWELL, C. J., and TYLER, MUNSON, START, WATSON, and HASELTON, JJ.
L. F. Wilbur, for plaintiff. Frederick G. Fleetwood, for defendant.
The question is whether a married woman who lives with her husband in a town where he last resided for the space of three years, supporting himself and family, thereby gains a residence in such town, within the meaning of the present pauper act, so as to make such town liable to another town in which she lives for support furnished to her, as a pauper, after the death of her husband. The plaintiff maintains the affirmative of this question on two grounds: (1) That a married woman thus living with her husband thereby gains a residence in her own right; (2) that, if this is not so, then, by the common law, which, it is claimed, is not changed by the present act, she derives her husband's residence in such town.
As to the first ground: Neither at common law, nor under our old settlement act, could one gain a settlement by residence, unless he was sui juris; and, as a married woman is not sui juris, but under the disability of coverture, she could not thus gain a settlement in her own right. Wells v. Westhaven, 5 Vt. 325; Brookfield v. Hartland, 10 Vt. 424. The same thing has been held under our present act in respect of unemancipated minor children, for the same reason, and because they cannot be said to support themselves, within the meaning of the act. Marshfield v. Tunbridge. 62 Vt. 455, 20 Atl. 106; Danville v. Hartford, 73 Vt. 300, 50 Atl. 1082. Under our old settlement act, one must not only have resided in the town the requisite time to gain a settlement by residence, but must have "maintained himself or herself"; and force was given to this last requirement in Brookfield v. Hartland, where it is said that a married woman living with her husband can with no propriety be said to maintain herself. And this is as true of a married woman under the present act as it was under the old act, and as it is of unemancipated minors under the present act.
As to the second ground: We do not regard this as an open question under the...
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Town of Glover v. Anderson
...decease of her husband she did not, therefore, take the settlement that he had while they were living together. Town of Jericho v. Morristown, 77 Vt. 367, 369-370, 60 A. 233, decided in 1906. The legislature at its next session by No. 102 of the Acts of 1906 provided that a married woman li......
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Town of Cambridge v. Town of Underhill, 741
...of unitary concept in the law of two persons joined in marriage, as related to a fixing of their pauper settlement. Town of Jericho v. Morristown, 77 Vt. 367, 60 A. 233, had held that a married woman could not gain an independent settlement. The revision dealt with this problem, and did bri......
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Town of St. Johnsbury v. Town of Sutton
...did not take their father's residence if he had one, which did not appear, Fairfax v. Westford, 67 Vt. 390, 31 A. 847; Town of Jericho v. Morristown, 77 Vt. 367, 60 A. 233, nor had they or their mother gained one in their own right. And we agree with defendant that the residence that the mo......
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Town of St. Johnsbury v. Town of Sutton
...status of these children. The reason for its enactment and the language of this statute refute any such idea. This Court held in Jericho v. Morristown, supra, decided 1905, that a married woman who lived with her husband in a town where he last resided three years, etc., did not thereby gai......